


Cracked

by worstloki



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Angst, Canon Divergence - Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Hurt Loki (Marvel), Hurt No Comfort, Hurt Thor (Marvel), Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Torture, JUST, Jotunn Loki (Marvel), Kinda hurt?, Light Angst, Loki (Marvel) Angst, Loki (Marvel) Needs a Hug, POV Thor (Marvel), Thor (Marvel) is Not a Good Bro, Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Whump, but obviously he'd still be hurt, he'd still have the marks, it'd be really cool if Loki healed the broken dead parts of himself with his magical essence, oh wow im going to be thinking about this concept for ages, so for him it kinda fills into a cool galaxy Jotun look because that's just what loki's made of, the way the arms are described could be completely unintentional of course, well it may have been intentional, well not hurt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-17 22:34:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29107881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/worstloki/pseuds/worstloki
Summary: Concept: Because of going through Ebony Maw's torture repeatedly Loki has cracks on his skin, all of them spiraling out of where Maw dug his needles in. His body is pretty much covered in cracks, from his cheeks down to his legs. He covers them all with a glamour. One day Loki's glamour breaks and Thor is there to see it.
Relationships: Loki/Pain
Comments: 26
Kudos: 128





	Cracked

**Author's Note:**

> Basically based off and originally posted because of an anon on tumblr right [ here ](https://worstloki.tumblr.com/post/640377938236342272/concept-because-of-going-through-ebony-maws) who suggested the concept of Loki having cracks on his skin he conceals with magic, which in turn made me think of Loki's Jotun skin bleeding through too, and how Loki would probably think he deserves whatever he gets and just shrug it off and live with it but then I thought about what'd happen if Thor found out and uhhhhhhhhh I can recognize angsty one-shot material when I see it thanks.

“Brother, you’re becoming predictable.”

Thor crouches down next to Loki who is twitching on the ground, held in place, immobile, by the obedience disk he had attached to the back of his shoulder just in case the need to _manage_ him had arose. And, it has.

“I trust you, you betray me, round and round—” Thor’s smile drops, and he watches in abject horror as the pulsing blood vessels visible across only half of Loki’s face start to fade from a heated purple into blue, snaking over its entirety, like sharp folds of marquina marble.

Loki’s eyes widen slightly, and his mouth opens in an attempt to speak, though he doesn’t manage any sound except a quickly cut-off choke. He continues convulsing, and Thor averts his gaze over to Loki’s hands, palms partially gloved, only to find the same shades of blue bleeding through, like cracks in his skin; _glistening_ cracks with a silvery outline that doesn’t manage to conceal what those exact blues mean to Loki. Or what they mean to _Thor_.

Those, as much as Thor wills to think it so, despite the colour, are not the natural markings of Jotun. He has fought Jotnar, and for all he’d been told of Loki being a frost giant he had been under the impression that even small for one, he at least looked as they did. 

The fissures run, outlines in silvery blue, to the tips of his fingers, Thor notes, and they are denser and coalesce through the centres of the palms and the areas directly under the cheekbones, from whence they spiral out.

They also slip under his sleeves and neckline, and Thor refuses to assume anything further than he can see; he refuses to imagine the rest of his brother’s skin divided in a mosaic of pales and blues, a harried patchwork of scars messily painted on, to imagine it a signifier of suffering passed, but also as a reminder infused into his very being. That Loki had been— that he _is_ broken. Thor refuses.

But he has lived a millennia and a half through battles —albeit most on smaller scales than inter-realm warfare— but he immediately _knows_.

He can recognize torture. 

And he can recognize magic.

And Thor refuses to think what combination of physical and psychological stress could do this to Loki of all people. _Loki._ The Loki he’d known his whole life to be the most stable, persevering and reserved person in mind. The same who would joke and run his mouth and cause mischief but also the brother he trusted to always be at his side. The Loki he’d pitch to be an unbreakable companion, both in mind and heart, whose mastery of seiðr and knives, however unconventional, were indicative of his strength, his control, his pride. 

And now Thor doesn’t even know why or for how long Loki has concealed this fractured form from him— he doesn’t know if Loki _would_ have _ever_ told him freely. Or if this too would’ve been another family secret carefully constructed to keep him in the dark, to mark him as untrustworthy to know. Another silent battle, locked away.

“You’ll always be a liar, Loki,” Thor concludes, disappointed, his heart heavy but knowing what he has said to be true, for who else but a coward would hide something like this? Something Thor may have at a time been able to have helped with, but now has no information nor empathy to spare, not for _him_.

Thor stands, turning his back to the alarm in Loki’s eyes, the slight shake of his head as if trying to refute the truth Thor can see with his own eyes.

He’s too hurt and angry at another of Loki’s deceptions to care about anything right now. He wants to go to Asgard and salvage what he can of the people he _knows,_ who he trusts wouldn’t conceal themselves behind _falsities_ , especially those of _being alright_ when _so much_ is _wrong_. 

Thor holds down on the remote in his hand, releasing the obedience disk’s hold on Loki, so that he may recast whatever illusion he no doubt wants to shield himself with, and he walks away, towards the ship.

Thor regrets not waiting till he was further away to relieve him of the pain when Loki’s ragged breathing breaks into voice behind him, and what he’d seen of Loki’s hands flash through his mind’s eye: cracks across his slender fingers and soft palms, cobalt streaks spreading around his wrist, which no doubt grow stronger rather than fainter further up the arm, likely another focal point for the corruption at the shoulder, the largest swirls emerging through the base of his sternum pierced through to covet both his back and chest in slivered crevices giving the illusion of shattered glass, another centrepoint a hairs-width above his hips on each side, rifts of blue emerging from the space between the lower thigh and knee in both directions, cracks curling around his feet from the roof of the ankle like vines. And, of course, the jagged cuts of blue he’d seen across his face. 

At the same time he also sees his brother as he’s known him for centuries, whatever he’d show of his entire body always unmarked, without scars, _clean_ , the same facial structure, the same bony wrists and hair and _softness_ — but now he doubts how much of that, if any of it, was real. 

Thor closes his eyes hard to hold back the welling tears, as if _anything_ Loki says can be a half-decent attempt to _justify—_ as if _any_ reason could ever be worth forgiveness for dismissively _concealing_ something like this, which has impacted _all of him_ enough for his own magic to taint his body in such a way of defense, to have pieced together whatever parts of him it could, and decide to hold him together so desperately under the distress he so evidently faced _alone._

Loki speaks, barely loud enough to make it to Thor’s ears over the sound of the dimming alarms as he walks, almost as if Loki’s words are first and foremost for himself, as if _he_ is the one who needs the comfort of them, and Thor a mere spectator.

“My skin was already a lie; I just added a few words of my own to it.”

Thor’s heart shutters and he feels his resolve crumbling. He ignores the pain in his chest and keeps walking away. 


End file.
